Bloodsport
by Lendruel
Summary: They both have sides they can't control, so they might as well keep each other company the only way they can. Please review/critique if you'd like to speed up the writing process, or just want to give your opinion.
1. Chapter 1

**Hello again.**

**Here's something new.**

For the fourth night this month, they are at each other's throats, quite literally. Biting and clawing, throwing themselves with reckless abandon, as the sounds of their warring echo through the hallway, bouncing off the rubberized walls of the training room. The sparring dummies are in splinters, there are dents in the walls, tables are snapped in half, and the two show no sign of slowing. They spin, tumbling, slamming into walls, the floor, each other, anything within reach becoming either a weapon or a target. Sometimes both. No speech, no words; only panting, animalistic snarls, broken only by the occasional ragged expulsion of breath that follows the landing of a blow. For a moment, they separate, the air between them charged with bloodlust and fire, the two of them equally bloody and battered. Both of them equally without control, grinning with sharp teeth as they circle each other. Then, a fist crashes into the side of his face, her legs are swept out from under her, and they fall together, all claws and teeth as their struggle brings them to the ground.

The first time this happened, the two had woken, bruised and aching, in the center of the war-zone that had once been the living room. Surrounded by the wreckage of the couch, its fluffy innards strewn about like snow, they had done what they could to either repair or hide the damage in shell-shocked silence. The couch had been beyond repair, and at some point one of them seemed to have thrown the other through the screen of the television. That had been a nightmare to explain to the team. After a second, similarly expensive incident, they learned to quarantine themselves to the training room or the roof when the need arose.

For once, Garfield finds himself winning. Snarling, fangs bared, he crashes into her again, ignoring the voice in the back of his mind that reminds him, mockingly, she isn't even using her powers. The voice pipes up again, as she sends him flying back against the dented wall, that he's probably lucky. He ignores it still, recovering from the blow and leaping forwards, attacking relentlessly each time she knocks him off his feet. The two of them are equally savage, but at opposite ends of the spectrum; Raven's demon is calculating, all technique and agility. His beast, on the other hand, is raw force, given form and an endless supply of energy. She can put him on the ground as many times as she likes, but he can barely feel the pain. All he has to do is outlast her, stay on his feet long enough to catch her off guard. Every other time they have fought, Garfield has found himself unconscious long before she grew tired, but not this time. This time, he can see her flagging, hear from the gasping of her breaths that her unnatural pool of stamina is finally running low. Through the blood dripping into his eyes, he sees her stagger, swaying slightly, clawed hands still raised. With bloody teeth, he grins, picking himself up once more, head cocked predatorially. She snarls again, eyes red, all four of them. The cruel grin is gone from her lips, now that she is backed into a corner. A slash of her claws, a kick to the center of his chest, ribs almost bending under the impact. The animals screaming in his head tell him to ignore the pain, tell him to welcome it. He is finally winning, for the first time, and his blood is singing, and—and she has him on his back again, her heel digging into his chest. With a frustrated growl, he thrashes, trying to throw her off, earning nothing but a two-toned laugh and a knee in his throat. She rests her weight upon him, moving her knee down enough to let him breathe.

"You lose, Gar." He looks up at her, still struggling, through a haze of blood, exhaustion, and head trauma. The words don't register at first, neither of them having spoken in the last half hour, but eventually they worm their way into his adrenaline-clouded mind. He sees her properly, sees her violet eyes, no longer flooded red. She kneels over him, one knee holding him down, her hair brushing his cheek. He pants, eyes wide, teeth still bared, staring up at her. Victorious again, her demon is satisfied. The beast, on the other hand, is clawing at his fingertips, screaming for his battered body to _get up, _get up, _bite, claw, get up, don't—_Garfield's eyes are pleading, behind the bloodlust. His beast won't let him rest until one of them is unconscious. Raven smiles down at him, gaze soft as she wipes a smear of blood from her mouth. Then, with only the slightest sign of smugness, she draws her fist back once more, and everything goes dark.


	2. Chapter 2

**Hello again, here's chapter two, leave a review if you like! I'm thinking that I'll be swinging back and forth between past and present a little, until the backstory is fully established.**

The room is dark when Garfield wakes up, and his mouth tastes like blood and ash. With a cough, he starts to sit up, only to be halted by a searing pain in his ribs, and a gentle hand on his forehead.

"I think we might have overdone it a little, that time." The voice comes from above him, a soft murmur in the dark. His eyes follow the hand up, until they meet the violet eyes of the girl above him. As he tilts his head back in her lap to look up at her, he realizes that they are no longer in the training room: at some point, she must have relocated them to the living room, to lay him down on the couch. Aside from a few scrapes, she seems barely worse-for-wear after their most recent session. He, on the other hand, feels like a bag of broken glass and rocks.

"You think? _I _think I have a few broken ribs this time." He complains, wincing, and lifts one bruised hand to poke gingerly at his torso. "How come I'm the only one who ends up all bendy in the wrong places?" He asks, pouting up at her. She raises an eyebrow, swatting the hand away from his ribs.

"Even with your powers, and all the animals you've been, you're still only human. I'm—well. I'm not." She looks up, out the darkened windows, not meeting his eyes, and shrugs. "It takes more to hurt a demon than a person, I guess." She falls silent after this, shoulders tight. One hand traces through a lock of Garfield's hair, green on grey. He moves one hand up with a scowl, taking hers.

"Don't say that." She looks down at him, her throat feeling tight, her face carefully blank. "Don't even think it." His expression is surprisingly fierce, leaving her thrown by the conviction in his voice. He grips Raven's hand tightly, the knuckles pressing once more against his bruised cheekbone.

"I—Thanks." She mutters, looking away, slightly uncomfortable with the expression in his eyes. Garfield looks up at her for a few moments more, with an odd look on his face that Raven can't place. After a while, he simply closes his eyes, resting back against her legs with a soft sigh. His whole body is sore, literally from head to toe, and yet... Something inside him feels satisfied. One of the rare moments when the beast is either sated, or too worn out to complain. So, he stays still, quiet, as Raven's fingers brush locks of forest green hair from his face.

It wasn't always like this, between the two of them. They had always been at odds, always bickering, but it had always been harmless. It was only later in life, as their inner passengers grew harder and harder to control, that their fights began to flare larger and larger. Something about the chemistry between he and her, between his beast and her demon, made them at once drawn to each other, and set them at each other's throats. Like some unnatural courtship, their passengers seemed to take pleasure in their competition, in the way the two ended up nose to nose, fists clenched, voices raised.

The first sign of any real change had been a few weeks ago, when, in the middle of their most heated argument, Garfield had found himself snarling, fangs bared like a wolf. The growl had been inhuman, animalistic, and he had stepped closer, fingers curling. Just for a moment, before he realized what he was doing, Raven's lips had parted in a wild grin, showing teeth that surely weren't always that sharp, and her eyes.. Her eyes had grown wide with fear, the cruel sneer dropping away, but just for a moment, there had been a flicker of red there. Without a word to each other or to the rest of the team, they had backed away, and fled the scene to their respective rooms. Their teammates had stood, shell-shocked.

It had been a long night of quiet, self-directed horror for the both of them. They had sat, imitating each other unknowingly, staring at their reflections. Waiting to see red eyes, to see sharp teeth and a savage grin. Waiting to see if they were about to lose control. Neither of the two slept that night, or the next. Or the night after that. When they finally emerged from their rooms, after two days of concerned teammates knocking on their doors, then banging on their doors, then threatening to break their doors down, they were exhausted, nervous wrecks. Robin had removed them from active duty for the time being, until they could talk their problems through and "sort their shit out". So, as the other three were called away to battle, Raven and Garfield were left, in tense silence, facing each other over the kitchen table. Garfield had been the first to speak, after long minutes of silence, and the plain, childlike fear in his voice had sent a shard of ice through Raven's heart. When he finally met her eyes, his were pleading, uncertain.

"What's happening to me?" He had asked, fists clenching and unclenching, knuckles white. "What's happening to us?"

Silence had been the only response.


End file.
